Mourning Monday

For several hours during the night I watched as the scene unfolded in the latest mass shooting, this time in Las Vegas. I used to do a number of legal municipal bond closings for McCarran Airport, always staying at the MGM and couldn’t help but wonder about the people of Vegas. The folks I worked with, the kind hotel staff that always made each visit as comfortable as possible. Vegas is not my kind of town, it’s noisy with too much glitz and goes against my thoughts on excess. With every visit for business, I witnessed behavior that was truly appalling from guests, but those who lived and worked there were just like people anywhere. Trying to get by, enjoy a slice of life, take care of and love their families. With each news story relating to mass shootings, my heart grows heavier with more despair. Why? Why do we accept this? Why do we do nothing to end it? Can anything even be done? I have no answers; the genie has been released from the bottle and can only offer my heartfelt thoughts and prayers to all those affected by this latest and most horrific shooting in US history. As I sit here in the safety of my home, the dogs snoozing close by, I silently weep that once again, a mad man with darkness and demented thoughts in his heart, took them out on the innocent. I am heart broken. This is not the way to start any week. And now I’ll go and donate blood for my own community since I know this scenario will likely repeat itself. #StoptheMadness

And how others can sit by and say now’s not the right time to talk about it. Maybe when people stop going to concerts and other events for fear there’s a unhinged person waiting, then maybe, just maybe people will come to their senses. Seems like the only way to extract change is economically. Morals don’t seem to matter as much. 💔

It’s hard to understand what’s going on in the minds of our elected leaders. I don’t mean in a political sense, but in a human sense. It’s easy to forget they’re human beings in all the mudslinging, and I am not so jaded as to believe they’re not losing sleep over this. But behind every bill knowingly advanced by Dems that would make zero difference but score political points, and behind every prayer offered by Republicans which offer no policy solutions, there *must* be human beings in existential agony over this continuing problem. So what do they tell themselves when they can’t sleep at night? I just don’t get it.

Absolutely. We’re so past any real solutions without everyone wigging out. Both sides are at fault. But now that there’re are enough guns for every single man, woman and child it seems safe that Pandora’s box can not be closed. Still I’m so sick of “thoughts and prayers” as the standard platitude. I feel we’re somewhat doomed on this issue. Still looking for real live humans.

It is a good thing that we can’t comprehend the kind of depravity that lurked in the mind of this lunatic. I don’t know how we can reverse the track we are heading down but I pray that we find a way. There seems to be a massive shortage of love and understanding in our world.

It is a complex issue but mom says it has to start with people on all sides being willing to admit there is a problem and that the problem can be improved upon if they are willing to talk. Mom emailed our senators today and hopes many people do the same.

I agree – let’s do something to stop the madness. I know it’s a taboo subject but we need more control of guns. Pharmacies track who get meds and have networks so that they know when someone is getting too many meds from multiple pharmacies. Why doesn’t something like this exist for guns? I’m sure some people disagree with me… but I believe that we must do “something”, and that’s the most obvious thing to me.

I never have understood the lack of licensure. Seems like a simply thing but Second Amendment fans seem to not want any controls for fear of it being a slippery slope. Seems ridiculous since there are enough guns in the US for nearly every man, woman and child. They aren’t going away any time soon so something must be done to make sure they are safely owned. The mentally ill should not be in that group. *Sigh*

How terrifying – for everyone … the people there … and the families of those people too. I imagine for many, the terror continues in terms of injuries or grief or not having heard from loved ones. I don’t understand how one could harbor so much hatred and anger – value human life so little.

It’s completely unfathomable what went through that man’s mind or any other mass shooter. Too many have been forever scarred by that horrific kind of terror which is now becoming an all too frequent of a visitor.

Unfortunately, nothing is going to change in this country until those who are only and wholly concerned with their own narcissistic agendas – which encompasses a myriad of things – get such a “comeuppance” that it shakes them to their very core and causes a true awakening of their currently-dead soul.

Let’s hope the comeuppance happens soon. By allowing these events to happen on a regular basis is making these horrific events seem somehow normal. Accountability for those that continue to allow this must occur.

I don’t know what the answers are, I just know they’re not easy; and it seems like no one is even trying to fix things. I saw the blurb on my phone notifications when I couldn’t sleep during the night, but didn’t look at the details. I was completely shocked when I woke up in the morning and heard just how horrific it was. I go to a lot of country music concerts, and I can’t help but wonder if I will think twice about doing so again. It feels like you’re taking a risk when you go to any public place these days! 🙁

I live in a country where there are very few guns. I have never actually seen a gun myself. So its particularly strange to me. There was a horrible mass shooting in a country town called Hungerford many years ago in the 1980s and the government tightened up gun controls a lot after that. So much suffering has been visited on so many people.

Sadly, I think there are too many guns currently out there so prevent any kind of meaningful gun control. Following this shooting (as it always happens), gun sales spiked. People think they need ‘protection’ even more following a shooting incident. We have gone completely mad.

Your words on yet another very ugly incident of mass gun violence in our country are so paradoxically beautiful. It’s just incomprehensible . . . again . . . that this happens. What causes a person to have that kind of disregard for human life? Why do the people who could limit the weapons that can do so much harm continue to turn their heads? I just cannot understand.

Without wishing to over-simplify this, why does somebody have so much disregard for human life? A possibility is a mental health issue. Why do people in the the arms business ignore what we see as the obvious? Business. To curtail the sales of arms will be as difficult as it was to get tobacco companies to admit the health hazards of smoking. A free enterprise system of business is great in theory, but unscrupulous profiteering is going to happen.

If a future election presents an individual that stands for better healthcare (including mental health), and a strict gun control with serious non-compliance penalties, remember that your feelings are only known if you cast your vote.

Well put, Colin, but sadly with this country’s dug-in divisions, I have little confidence there will be a ground swell to support that logical way of thinking. We can only hope and continue to be a voice of reason against the insanity this acquiescence breeds.

I vote in every election–national and local–and I support candidates who work to improve healthcare and access to healthcare–including mental healthcare–and those who support gun control.
Miss Harper Lee’s human

Excellent. Keep spreading “the word” and it might just catch-on as a basis for changing some other folks outlooks!. It just needs a politician to hear people like you, and it could become a voting issue.

Well said. My husband travels there on business as well and while Las Vegas is a unique place, mass shootings in the U.S. are sadly not unique. So many things to think about…again…gun control and mental health, just to name two.

My son-in-law attended a conference at the Mandalay Bay hotel not that long ago. These events are getting way to close for comfort. While I’m not overly optimistic, I hope and pray today’s tragedy jolts our conscious into some positive action.

I only read it this morning, and I am still stunned and sad, so sad! And, I must admit, totally hopeless that the appallling situation wil become better. To the contrary, having followed the issue of gun-control over the years, I am sure – to my utter dismay – that it will only get worse.
Praying for the victims,
Pit

I hope that the collective US conscience will eventually demand gun controls.
Gun control will never stop random killings… but it can certainly make them more difficult to plan.
Gun control will never get all firearms “off the street”, but at least there will be a law in place that can be administered as necessary. Anybody caught carrying a firearm will have it confiscated and due charges pressed.
Everybody should have the right to expect a safe/secure society in which to live. It is the elected officials responsibility to ensure that expectation is achieved, and it is the various law enforcement agencies responsibility to get it done. It is not the individuals responsibility to take charge.
Sadly, it would appear that the “wild west” culture of “frontier justice” is still heavily ingrained in so many people, but the US is a very different place now. One day… who knows!

There are many who feel the Constitution allows them free & unfettered access with no limits. Sadly I fear this will just be yet another tally of bloodshed and the country will move on. to the next one. But if there was ever a reason to ban assault weapons, this would be it.

I only clicked “like” because this was beautifully written and I share your sentiment. When I turned the TV on at 7am I was in shock, or was I? It is almost commonplace to turn on the TV and learn about another awful, senseless mass shooting (and this one, the largest in U.S. history). The U.S. has the largest number of deaths by gunfire of any country. Something needs to be done…you know that, I know that……….but the powers that be, keep defending no gun control. The latest madman did reside in Vegas, he wasn’t visiting there. It’s all so senseless, heartbreaking and insane. (((hugs))))

I started watching it at midnight and then listened to it on the BBC in bed for a few hours. We have lost our moral footing it seems on so many issues, but this one really leaves one particularly stunned. And sadly, if assault weapons couldn’t be contained after a dozen children were killed I don’t know what will make people realize there is a significant problem. Like I said, the genie is out of the bottle and I’m not sure how to get it back inside. 💔